Landlocked Colorado’s seaplane enthusiasts want fewer takeoff and landing restrictions on state waters

The Icon A5 seaplane is a sleek amphibious machine.

Unfold the carbon-fiber composite wings from the body, tilt them horizontally, rip the 100-horsepower Rotax engine and you’re good to go.

Except that there are few bodies of water where a seaplane pilot can land or take off legally in Colorado, said Jeremy Rogers, a Niwot resident who started piloting his 2023 Icon A5 last year.

“Colorado is the adventure capital of the United States,” said Rogers, a sports chiropractor who has kayaked, adventure-run and flown glider planes for years. “It’s a shame that seaplane pilots can’t have the same access to waterways that other states provide.”

According to the Seaplane Pilots Association, Colorado ranks at the bottom in the nation — or close to it — for seaplane access. Colorado Parks and Wildlife tightly maintains a 42-year ban on seaplane operations on the 3,200 lakes and reservoirs the agency oversees across the state.

“It’s among the worst,” Steven McCaughey, the executive director of the advocacy group, said of Colorado. “It’s the state we’ve spent the most energy trying to open up.”

Chris Arend, a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, said both his agency and CPW remain concerned about “safety and capacity conflicts between seaplanes and other recreational uses, resource limitations and the potential spread of aquatic nuisance species.”

Those waterborne nuisances, such as zebra and quagga mussels, have been occasionally found in Colorado lakes and reservoirs in the last few years, including in stretches of the Colorado River earlier this year.

Mussels cause a host of issues, including clogging reservoir dams, outlet structures and distribution systems. They can also infest boats, damage engines and disrupt the natural food web. State wildlife officials have been trying to stem their spread, including with programs requiring prelaunch boat inspections at lakes.

But that hasn’t dissuaded Ray Hawkins, an Aurora retiree who earned his pilot’s license in 1970, from pushing for more seaplane access in Colorado.

Hawkins, who serves as executive director of the Colorado Seaplane Initiative, has managed to work out arrangements to use Lake Meredith Reservoir near Ordway and Kenney Reservoir near Rangely for seaplane landings and takeoffs. Neither body of water is under CPW jurisdiction, but they are far from the Front Range, Hawkins said.

That has the 73-year-old former computer specialist gunning for a potential bill that might ease restrictions on the aircraft during the next legislative session, which begins on Jan. 14. It would be his fourth attempt, after three unsuccessful legislative tries in 2016, 2017 and 2018.

For Hawkins, it’s a matter of basic fairness.

“If you allow power boats, then you cannot arbitrarily ban seaplanes,” he argued. “A seaplane is no different than a power boat — it just gets into the water in a slightly different manner.”

‘It’s a fairness issue’

Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s predecessor agencies, the Division of Wildlife and Colorado State Parks, said no to any aircraft landings or takeoffs from its lakes and reservoirs, including by “airplanes, helicopters, gliders, hot air balloons, hang gliders, parachutes, parasails, kite boards, kite tubes, zip lines and other similar devices or equipment.”

The year was 1983 — and the agency hasn’t backed off its position since. It reaffirmed its opposition in 2024, with the CPW commission denying a change to the rule.

“The intent of the 1983 regulation was to ensure public safety by designating recreational uses that were compatible with the needs of park users and the surrounding neighbors and communities,” Arend said.

According to CPW spokesman Travis Duncan, “there is no way to inspect a seaplane for aquatic nuisance species before it lands on a state water body.”

“In addition to the increased risk from (invasive species), aerial work often impacts and can cause increased risk for other recreational activities,” he said.

But McCaughey says the seaplane community is willing to go above and beyond to satisfy the state’s concerns. If they’re flying from another body of water, pilots can land at a nearby airport, transport their plane by trailer to the lake and decontaminate in the same way boat owners do.

“We will meet or exceed the required inspection that the boating community goes through,” he said.

In terms of safety, McCaughey said seaplanes are involved in far fewer accidents than boats. According to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, there were 406 seaplane accidents in the United States from 2008 to 2022. Only 77 of them were fatal. By contrast, in just 2023 alone, the U.S. Coast Guard reported nearly 4,000 accidents involving boats, resulting in 564 fatalities.

McCaughey also points out that retrofitted seaplanes can be tapped for critical work, like scooping water at lakes and reservoirs to help in fighting fires.

Colorado wildlife officials, he feels, have been clinging to ossified policies in need of a fresh look.

” ‘We don’t have seaplanes, we’ve never had seaplanes’ — we have to get past that,” McCaughey said, characterizing what he sees as the prevailing view. “We want some sense of reasonable access.”

Rogers, the adventure athlete, said he’d confronted similar resistance from water districts that manage many other bodies of water in Colorado. They often follow state restrictions as a matter of course, he said.

“The water districts don’t want to have to manage another user class — that’s the fundamental issue,” he said.

Rogers, 51, often flies just over the state line into Nebraska to land on and take off from Lake McConaughy, where access is unimpeded.

Or he goes even farther out of state. On a recent afternoon, Rogers was loading his Icon A5 into a trailer at his hangar at Vance Brand Airport in Longmont for a long road trip to Texas, where the flying machine was due for a tune-up.

“In Texas, you can land on anything,” he said.

Colorado’s restrictive seaplane environment could prompt another attempt to ease up the rules at the statehouse — in what would be the fourth attempt in a decade. Kelly Sloan, who has frequently lobbied on behalf of the aviation industry at the Colorado Capitol, said he is piecing together a strategy for running a bill in the next session.

“It’s a fairness issue,” he said.

8,000 seaplane pilots in Colorado

The seaplane industry, Sloan said, is not a big constituency and likely won’t figure high on any lawmaker’s list of priorities. But the Seaplane Pilots Association said Colorado has 8,000 certified seaplane pilots, ranking ninth among U.S. states.

The economic potential from those numbers is already baked in, Sloan said, as long the regulatory environment in Colorado eases somewhat.

“I think there is some tourism business that is actually being lost without that access” to water, he said.

The issue has gotten the attention of state Rep. Naquetta Ricks. Hawkins, the seaplane promoter, is Ricks’ constituent and has asked her for help under the Gold Dome.

The lawmaker says it’s possible she’ll run a bill in the 2026 session.

“I would really like to see that everyone enjoys the resources we have,” Ricks said. “Other states have figured it out — what is our plan?”

While some states see heavy seaplane use — think Alaska and Florida — the aircraft haven’t been without user conflict. Several years ago, a controversy exploded on Seattle’s Lake Union over how much berth seaplanes should get while using the lake.

But Hawkins said seaplane pilots are sensitive to their impacts and aren’t asking for access to high-use recreational facilities in Colorado. Perhaps just a couple of bodies of water closer to Denver, he said.

“Give us something,” Hawkins said.

Carl Mattson, a certified seaplane pilot for nearly half a century, said he used his 1974 LA-4-200 Buccaneer seaplane to woo his second wife. He flew her to Lake McConaughy and splashed down for lunch. They are still married 15 years later.

He has owned two seaplanes — a 1982 Cessna 206 amphibious aircraft alongside the Buccaneer — but because of Colorado’s restrictions on their use, he has sold both. It wasn’t worth trying to keep his pilot’s license current with so few places to legally practice landings and takeoffs in the state, Mattson said.

He sees a glimmer of hope with the Dec. 1 appointment of Major General Laura Clellan as the acting director of Colorado Parks and Wildlife, in the wake of the previous director stepping down after less than three years.

“A new set of eyes — hopefully someone who is more receptive takes over,” Mattson said. “Give us a chance. Let us show you that we can do this.”

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